Canada’s iZEV incentive program goes live
Canada’s iZEV incentive program goes live
Posted on May 6, 2019
The Canadian government has rolled out a new incentive program that could offer significant discounts for electric vehicles in British Columbia and Quebec. The incentive could see discounts of up to $13,000 of the list price of a new EV or zero emission vehicle.
The new scheme hopes to encourage more Canadians to embrace electric motoring by helping with the cost. The scheme includes PHEV, battery electric and hydrogen powered cars. It went live on May 1 2019 and includes both purchases and leases of at least 48 months.
This is good news for provinces without an existing EV incentive scheme and for those whose schemes have just expired like in Ontario.
As you would expect, there are conditions. They include a ceiling price of $45,000 for the vehicle. Taxes are applied pre-discount. The discount can be compounded with other discounts for more savings and the vehicle has to have no more than six seats.
If you paid a deposit for an EV before May 1 but complete the deal after that date, you are eligible for the scheme. If you bought at any time before May 1, you’re out of luck.
Vehicle choice
The list of eligible vehicles is here. They include the Ford Fusion Energi, Focus Electric, Kia Niro PHEV, Niro EV, Optima PHEV and Soul EV among cars from other manufacturers. There is a decent range here with both Ford and Kia offering EVs in different sizes and configurations. There should be something here for everyone.
There are two levels of iZEV incentive:
- Longer range vehicles with a battery capacity of at least 15kWh or hydrogen fuel cells are eligible for an incentive of $5,000.
- Shorter range plug-in hybrid electric vehicles with battery capacity less than 15kWh are eligible for an incentive of $2,500.
With our EV infrastructure improving all the time and more charging stations appearing in public spaces, now is a great time to invest in electric motoring. Prices have yet to come down by too much but the remain static and with this kind of discount, makes them competitive against gasoline cars.
Add the increases in range we are seeing in EVs and there is even more reason to try one. Those old limitations of only being able to go to the store and back on a charge are long gone and 200+ miles is now the norm.
We may not hit that original 300,000 EV target by the end of 2020 like originally planned but any increase in electric motoring is a good thing for owners and for the environment.
Visit Northway Ford Lincoln, 388 King George Road Brantford ON N3S 3N2 or Grimsby Kia, 435 South Service Road Grimsby, ON L3M 4E8 to check out the eligible vehicles!